


anywhere else (OR; the things we give to each other, asking nothing in return)

by tamsinb



Category: Blaseball (Video Game)
Genre: Angst, Baltimore Crabs (Blaseball Team), Chicago Firefighters (Blaseball Team), Gen, Rest In Violence, dont tell tillman how badly i miss him, gay and sad, hed make fun of me
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-08
Updated: 2020-10-08
Packaged: 2021-03-07 20:34:39
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,967
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26893762
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tamsinb/pseuds/tamsinb
Summary: A heat, a violence. Miles and time. Friends, a loss, proximity and transport. New and old. Transport and distance.Declan Suzanne makes a drive when he hears the news. (An incineration angst fic.)
Relationships: Tillman Henderson/Declan Suzanne
Comments: 5
Kudos: 48





	anywhere else (OR; the things we give to each other, asking nothing in return)

* * *

_"i’m in love with how you make me feel_ _like i’m not so alone_

_but i can go_

_if you feel like giving up_

_just make a mess of me, i’ll always clean it up”_

_"get bummed out”, remember sports_

* * *

As he sprinted off the field Declan Suzanne was pondering faster than light travel. It was the bottom of the seventh inning and they were losing too badly for his absence to make a difference. He’d played a million games with ships that flew faster than light but he wondered if his el camino could do the same. How else could he make it to San Francisco fast enough? Fast enough to… To? Was there something he had to do?

The scoreboard had bannered with the news bulletin whose color no one ever wanted to see but no one ever thought it would really be for them. “Rogue Umpire incinerated Crabs hitter Tillman Henderson!” it read. Declan drove, miles a poor substitute for thought.

***

The Crabs team lolled aimlessly near the stadium as Declan pulled up. It had taken hours and yet he arrived earlier than he’d left. A few of them saw him approach and didn’t have the energy to feign surprise, after all who else would it be? Who else would come for someone like-

Declan wouldn’t let himself finish that thought and so he grabbed out with words towards whoever was nearest, asking a question he already knew the answer to.

“It was the bottom of the fifth,” said Pedro Davids, who was around. “He, uh. He thought he’d made the throw and the umpire disagreed. So he said,”

“Don’t tell me he-”

“‘What are you gonna do, incinerate me?’”

Declan kicked the ground. That dumbass. That was the line he’d always told Declan he’d use in exactly that sort of situation. And Declan had always laughed. He still wanted to laugh. He wanted it to still be funny.

“We, uh, we tried to get over as fast as we could but, well they started the game up pretty quick and nobody else wanted to step out of line. You know what can happen.”

He supposed he did. Declan did his best to swallow and nod and search for anything else to say just to keep himself listening or talking or anything besides drowning beneath swimming thoughts and seaweed tears.

“Most of us were around when Combs uh. Yknow. Not that it’s any easier but we’ve been here before, you know?” The answer to a question Declan didn’t remember asking. “Tot’s pretty broken up.”

Declan looked over to where Tot Fox was curled up, wrapping his tail around him for protection or warmth. Forrest Best was petting him with the smooth back of one of its many claws as its mannequin body hung limp as ever. Behind them, Nagomi Mcdaniel and Axel Trololol lay encased in peanut shell. Someone had tipped their forms so that one (who could tell which?) was leaning against the other, as if a shoulder to cry on. Declan hoped it was intended to be a sweet gesture but in the moment it just seemed macabre. A summation of everything so deliriously fucked up with this splort.

And suddenly Declan had to leave and it hit him how far away he was from home - it was a home game, he was supposed to go home that night and put in a few rounds of the battle royale game that Tillman said was for kids but Declan would stream it to him anyways and he’d always watch and they’d stay up so late together and Declan tried to remember what it sounded like to hear him but it seemed indistinct and somehow he couldn’t imagine anything in Tillman’s voice so even in his memories he was alone.

Pedro mistook his frantic glances. “Wanna meet the new teammate?”

“Oh. Uh.” Declan tried to meet his eyes.

“Over this way, cmon.”

Pedro led him through the group and he passed Kennedy Loser who was flitting around doing his best to be with whoever was feeling the worst at the moment. Most were bearing it listlessly. A few were upset at the fact that Tillman still owed them money. Declan did his best not to let it get to him but he didn’t do a great job. He’d stopped counting his dues a long time ago.

“In here.”

“Pedro this is a wall.”

And yet, in the wall impossibly was a pair of old timey swinging doors. He squinted and Pedro nodded and so he pushed them open and they swung him in and he found himself standing on a smooth wooden floor in a dimly lit room.

“Welcome to the Roadhouse!”

He was in some kind of… well,.saloon was the only way to put it. Empty tables and on the other side of the room a bar with an imposingly large wall of bottles behind, presided over by a grizzled man wearing a cowboy hat. He turned behind him and outside was a harsh blue sky and desert. A tumbleweed rolled past.

“Why doncha come up n take a load off?” said the man behind the bar and Declan obliged, sitting on the surprisingly comfortable round chair. “What’ll it be?”

Declan shrugged and the man chuckled.

“Oh, we got plenty of that. Comin’ right up.”

The man slipped away and Declan sank back into his chair. As he did he noticed the figure sitting next to him, instantly recognizable as Sutton Dreamy.

“Oh! Uh. Hey!” he said, voice pitching from surprise.

She held a finger to her mouth and pointed down. In her lap was the head of a very drunk, very passed out Parker Parra.

“She was distraught,” said Sutton. “Her method of processing was to simulate her actions during a prospective shortage of alcohol products.” She idly patted Parker’s head of springy curls and Parker gave a ‘snrt’ in response.

“And uh. How are you? Doing, that is.”

Sutton looked at him. They both knew it made sense for her to ask him that, but he asked anyway. She considered.

“When Combs left I was surprised by everyone’s actions. They seemed to be experiencing something and when I asked them what it was they seemed surprised that I was not already in the place they were. It represented a distance. And this time the facts are the same but circumstances differ. And I think that if I am able to support my friends who need it then this is enough. Do you agree?”

“Yeah,” said Declan, because he knew it was the thing you said and not because he agreed. He felt envy rise within him even as he wished he too could feel nothing.

“Good,” said Dreamy. “Now, I will make sure that Parker Parra makes it to her hotel room.” She propped Parra up and gathered her, carrying her out.

At the door she stopped and looked back at Declan. “You are free to ask for help as well. From me. And from others. Do you know this?”

“Yeah, yeah, I got it. Make sure she gets home safe,” he said, waving her off.

Sutton nodded and left and her form faded and vanished as she left the saloon. Which, come to think of it. Declan had been some strange places in his seasons in blaseball. And this was definitely one of them. He was admiring the decor when a cough came from one of the tables. The first thing he saw was an impressive pair of boots with an impressive pair of spurs placed crossed over the table, attached to two legs that led up to a figure reclining dangerously far in their seat, hat tipped far down their face.

“Started to reckon’ y’all was ignoring me, now,” they said, kicking their legs off the table and leaning forward in the same motion with which they pushed their hat out of their face. They were young, spright, and had a straightforward face. Hair cropped perfectly straight just below chin length. Strong smile with no trace of selfdoubt.

“Oh uh sorry I just er um I-” stammered Declan.

“Aw, I’m jus’ joshin’ ya, partner,” they said, smiling. “Th’ name’s Roadhouse. Silvaire Roadhouse, newest member of the Baltimore Crabs, at yer service.”

Declan stared at them. They’d replaced Tillman, he thought. They’d replaced Tillman with a fucking _cowboy._ He couldn’t think of anything Tillman would hate more. The corners of his mouth turned up and he had to laugh.

Silvaire bristled. “Well now, I don’t think it’s nothin’ to laugh at.”

“Ah! Um, sorry, I just. You’re so different is all…”

They laughed. “Well from what I’ve heard ‘bout that rascal I reckon I’ll take that as a compliment. I take it y’all knew ‘im?”

“Uh, you could say that.”

“Friends?”

“Uh-”

“Boyfriends?”

“Uh…” He felt a blush rise to his face. He couldn’t remember if they’d even ever talked about what they were to each other. Should they have? It was always so hard to talk about stuff like that with him. It was always easier to leave it unsaid but now? It left him feeling like the whole thing might’ve been nothing, like he could wipe it all away and like sand it’d fall to the shore indistinguishable from the landscape, something never to be found again.

“Aw, hey, c’mon now,” said Silvaire comfortingly, standing up to walk to where Declan was sitting. “Hey, Pops, hurry up with that drink! Fellow out here needs it.”

“I’m comin’, I’m comin’,” grumbled the large man as he reentered with a large mug. “Not as spry as I used to be.”

“This here’s my pops,” introduced Silvaire.

“Pleased ta make yer acquaintance,” he said. “The name’s Silvaire Roadhouse.”

Declan looked between them. “Same name?”

“That’s right,” said the elder of the two. “And they even let me bat on account of it, seein’ as my name’s technically on the roster.”

“Course I gotta take over the runnin’ afore pops busts a hip again,” snickered the younger.

And it was there, as he took the mug in his hand, as the two continued to snipe at each other, as he took a sip and all he could taste was cold, as he sat in a saloon hundreds of years outmoded, as he sat thousands of miles from Chicago (where he was from), that Declan Suzanne felt more alone than he ever had before.

He stood and asked how much he owed.

“On the house,” said the elder, and he nodded and made for the exit.  
  
“Nice havin’ ya, partner,” said the younger, as he left. “Come back anytime now, ya hear?”

He turned back and tried to say something but couldn’t.

“I know it’s, er, how do I say it. Well, I know I ain’t quite the same as yer pal, and I ain’t tryin’ to replace ‘im or nothin’. But uh, well if y’all could consider me a friend irrespective of him, I’d be right honored.”

Declan hated himself for it but in their eager face he saw the briefest flash of Tillman, and he was defeated.

“Yeah. Yeah, Silvaire, of course. Of course.”

Their smile was bright as they saw Declan off and he pushed open the swinging doors to find that he was actually opening the door to his apartment. He walked inside and set the mug that he hadn’t realized he’d carried out onto the counter and he flopped onto his couch and he lost himself in a memory that started on the couch and when that one moved elsewhere he slipped into another where he and Tillman had been on this couch for hours and neither of them ever wanted to be anywhere else.

Declan cried for a while, and then a second while after that.

**Author's Note:**

> Posting this without reading it a second time, so if I mess anything up idk yell at me. Keep thotting it up in hell tillman, we'll hold a place for you out here.


End file.
